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Sharif University of Technology has confirmed that six students have been expelled following disciplinary proceedings connected to the protests of Dey 1404 (December 2025–January 2026), while 115 students have faced formal disciplinary cases, raising serious concerns about students’ rights to education, freedom of expression, peaceful assembly, and due process.
Mahmoud Behman-Abadi, Sharif University’s vice president for student affairs, said that 236 students were initially referred to the university’s disciplinary authorities, with formal cases ultimately opened against 115 of them. Approximately 40 students accused of more serious violations were summoned before the disciplinary council, while other students were subjected to meetings and required to provide written commitments.
Behman-Abadi defended the university’s actions, saying the cases involved allegations including raising monarchist flags, burning or insulting the flag of the Islamic Republic, carrying knives, physical altercations, creating unrest, and chanting what authorities characterized as norm-breaking slogans. He also said some cases concerned students’ online activities during the war.
These allegations vary substantially in seriousness. Credible allegations of violence or possession of weapons can legitimately be investigated by a university. Political expression, protest, slogans, or other peaceful activity, however, should not be treated as equivalent to violent conduct or used as grounds for depriving students of their education. Publicly available information also does not make it possible to independently establish the facts underlying each individual disciplinary case.
The confirmation of the expulsions follows an unusual public intervention by 44 Sharif faculty members, who issued an open letter on August 22 titled “For Sharif.” The professors criticized both the severity of the punishments and the disciplinary process through which they were imposed and called for the decisions to be reviewed.
The professors described Sharif not simply as an institution governed by regulations but as an “academic and human family.” Recalling the October 2, 2022 crackdown at Sharif when security forces entered the campus, confronted students, and arrested a number of them, as well as subsequent confrontations between students and authorities, the professors argued that years of punitive responses to student dissent have damaged trust between students and university administrators.
Their letter singled out the case of a student who this year received expulsion and a four-year ban from continuing his education on disciplinary grounds, describing such a punishment by Sharif’s own disciplinary authorities as unprecedented in the university’s history.
Faculty members also raised concerns about the fairness of the proceedings. According to their account, professors had objected from the beginning to the composition of the disciplinary council and the manner in which cases were reviewed. They later attempted to have a faculty member accompany a student whose expulsion was being reviewed by the Central Disciplinary Council at the Ministry of Science. The faculty representative was prevented from participating in the proceeding, despite the professors’ contention that the disciplinary regulations did not expressly prohibit such participation.
The professors argued that preventing such representation undermined the student’s ability to present an effective defense and raised broader questions about the transparency and fairness of the disciplinary process.
Student activists have meanwhile reported an even larger number of expulsions, saying that at least ten Sharif students have been expelled. That figure has not been independently confirmed and differs from the six expulsions acknowledged by university officials.
Universities in Iran have their own disciplinary rules and committees which have the power to suspend or expel students. Students can potentially be punished by the university and also face a separate case in court for the same incident. This compounds the risks facing students who engage in protests, as they could face not just the threat of harm from security forces and judicial punishment, but also direct implications for their education and career prospects.
The pressure is also not confined to Sharif. Recent reports indicate that around 40 students at Khajeh Nasir Toosi University have been summoned, while approximately ten students at Amirkabir University have reportedly faced disciplinary summonses. Student groups at the University of Tehran and Shahid Beheshti University have also reported expulsions. The precise circumstances and numbers in these cases require further verification, but taken together, the reports raise concern about a broader escalation of disciplinary pressure on university students ahead of the new academic year.
The cases follow the January 2026 protests, which began amid worsening economic conditions and rapidly expanded into broader anti-government demonstrations. The protests were met with a severe and deadly state crackdown. Iranian authorities themselves have acknowledged thousands of deaths, while opposition sources have published differing and in some cases substantially higher estimates. Severe restrictions on independent reporting and access to information continue to make the full death toll difficult to verify.
The current disciplinary measures therefore cannot be separated from the wider environment in which Iranian students have faced repeated pressure over political expression and participation in protests. Universities have a responsibility to address genuine threats to the safety of students and faculty, but disciplinary procedures must distinguish between such conduct and the exercise of fundamental rights.
NIAC strongly condemns the use of expulsion, suspension, or deprivation of education as punishment for peaceful protest, political expression, or other protected student activity. Removing students from universities for exercising these rights constitutes a serious violation of the right to education and further restricts freedom of expression and peaceful assembly on Iranian campuses.
The scale of the proceedings at Sharif – 236 referrals, 115 formal cases, and six expulsions confirmed by the university itself – as well as the serious procedural concerns raised publicly by dozens of its own faculty members, demand a transparent and independent review. Students facing allegations must be informed of the evidence against them and given a meaningful opportunity to defend themselves in a a fair and impartial process. Any punishment must be based on established conduct and must be necessary and proportionate.
The intervention of 44 Sharif professors underscores what is ultimately at stake. A university cannot fulfill its educational mission when disagreement is answered with exclusion and students fear that political expression may cost them their education. Protecting students’ rights, ensuring genuine due process, and rebuilding trust within Iran’s universities are obligations that Iranian authorities should address directly and without delay.